Spadò – Il danzatore nudo: a documentary on Alberto Spadolini

 Official trailer of the documentary.

Attics sometimes reveal entire worlds, dusty and long forgotten. Spadò – Il danzatore nudo [Spadò: the nude dancer] opens in an attic, with a dusty, somewhat vintage atmosphere and a double bell alarm clock. Because this is a journey through time, the time when Alberto Spadolini, (1907-1972), a young boy from Ancona, Marche, went to live in Rome in the 1920s, where he studied painting and then moved again to France, where he became a famous music-hall dancer in 1932.

Spadolini’s rediscovery began in 1978 precisely in an attic, where his nephew, MarcoTravaglini found a box filled with documents of all sorts (photographs, articles, posters etc.) about his uncle’s life in France. Spadolini did not really talk of his role as dancer and Travglini was surprised at what he discovered. He went back to this material in 2004 when he methodically started to search for his uncle’s secret past. The documentary creates an evocative atmosphere as Travaglini speaks in the attic, “every now and then our particularly mysterious uncle would come (…) he was very loved and would come to visit us once or twice a year. He would come in a big enormous American car" with presents for his nephews.

Riccardo De Angelis and Romeo Marconi have directed the first documentary on this little known artist, in collaboration with Marco Travaglini, who is also the director of Atelier Spadolini. Spadò was the nickname with which Spadolini was called by his friends and sometimes by the press. The title also refers to the fact that he often danced almost nude and should not be confused with Travaglini’s homonymous 2012 book title. This documentary is a fascinating journey divided into three intertwined planes: one centred on material on and by Spadolini, another represented by people who either knew him (his nephews and a friend) or know about him (a journalist, a writer, an art historian, myself as dance historian etc.), and the third one made by the Nicoletta Fabbri Quartet’s Paris-inspired music (one member of the Quartet is Stefano Travaglini, Marco's brother).  

Journalist and writer Alberto Bignami brings us to Spadolini’s birth as a love child: his mother, Ida, was working as a maid in the house of an aristocratic family, had an affair with her master, got pregnant and was fired because of that. She was about to leave Ancona, when railway worker Angelo Spadolini, earned her trust and welcomed her and her baby in his house.

Writer and philosopher Antonio Luccarini tells us that young Alberto showed a gift for drawing and started studying painting with local artist Armando Bandinelli. He then moved to Rome to study with Vatican painter Giambattista Conti. In the capital he attended Anton Giulio Bragaglia’s Teatro degli Indipendenti where many avant-garde artists were. According to art historian, Stefano Papetti, Spadolini “surely deserves (...) to be better investigated”. There is a dynamism pervading his painted figures that may come from his contact with the futurist painters that he probably met at the Teatro.

A good part of the documentary is devoted to the supposed friendship betweeen Spadolini and Gabriele D’Annunzio, about which Travaglini has talked since his first book on his uncle, Bolero-Spadò: Alberto Spadolini, una vita di tutti i colori (2007). Art historian, biographer, illustrator Philippe Jullian thanks Spadolini in the acknowledgment page of his 1971 book on Gabriele D’Annunzio, “Spadolini, the famous dancer, has told me about the trip he made to the Vittoriale when he was very young”. The Vittoriale degli Italiani is a set of constructions promoted by D’Annunzio in Gardone Riviera in the North of Italy. There he spent the last part of his life and there he apparently met Spadolini in 1924. Jullian does not explicitly name him, in the book, but when we read of a young decorator who becomes D’Annunzio’s friend and then goes to France, we can easily make the connection with the reference the author has previously made in the acknowledgment page. This connection has been corroborated by one of Spadolini’s friends, Patrick Oger who has confirmed to Travaglini that the young decorator in Jullian’s book is Spadolini. In the documentary, historian and biographer Giordano Bruno Guerri, who has written on D’Annunzio, highlights the possibility of this encounter even though the sources are not consistent enough.

Poster of the documentary.

Another aspect of Spadolini’s life which lacks consistent sources is his possible role as secret agent. Writer and essayst Fabio Filippetti, states that when one talks about the secret service “it is difficult to gain information”. However, Spadolini was a known artist and could move in different places without arousing suspects. And the intersting thing is that “we find him (…) in strategic cities in particular during the [Second] World War”. Travaglini explains his view on the matter quoting, among other elements, the friendship between Spadolini and codex enthusiast Ives Gilden. It is possible that further material will emerge with time.

I had the task of speaking of the role of Spadolini as dancer. I was quite nervous during the interview and did not say as much as I wanted. I called Spadolini a primitivist dancer as he performed in various acts inspired by those cultures that at the time were seen as primitivist. Primitivism is a complex, colonial and controversial notion that invests various fields such as art and literature. At the turn of the twentieth century it had to do with Westerns’ fascination for the Others whose works began to be considered as art and inspired many Westerners’ artistic forms. Pablo Picasso’s Les demoiselles d’Avignon is the recurrent example, in this sense. I did not refer to these aspects in my interview, but De Angelis and Marconi focused on one of Spadolini’s few recorded primitivist performances, his solo in 1936 Pierre Caron’s film, Marinella. There Spadolini moves nearly nude on a small stage in the shape of a drum, recalling perhaps a primitivist culture ritual and mingling diverse dance techniques such as classical dance and flamenco. Spadolini was also famous for his Bolero that he probably presented in 1933 and that was set to Maurice Ravel’s music and was noted for his interpretation in Gigue to Bach’s music, the same year.

In the documentary Luccarini emphasises how Spadolini became a dancer “without any technical knowledge” and before that I quote Jenny Josane’s 1941 article where Spadolini himself confirms that. However, there are other sources that state otherwise and it is very likely that he studied dance during his Roman period. Furthermore, after his 1932 debut at the Casino de Paris, he also started taking classes from two ballet teachers, Alexandre Volinine and Blanche D’Alessandri.

Of particular interest is Sergio Sadotti’s testimony. He knew Spadolini in the years 1957 and 1958 when the artist would go to Porto Sant’Elpidio to visit his sister who lived under his flat, “Alberto immediately stood out for his personality, a great personality and elegance (…). I saw him paint paintings that he would quickly roll and send to his gallerist in Paris.”

These and other interviews are all blended in with beautiful images of Spadolini’s statuesque presence and of Paris. More specifically, video fragments from his own black and white 1950 documentary, Rivage de Paris, flow and reveal monuments of the city such as the Eiffel tower as well as its musicians, like an accordion player whose image is elegantly juxtaposed to that of the Nicoletta Fabbri Quartet. One of the songs the Quartet plays is Josephine Baker’s 1930 “J’ai deux amours”, which is apt for Spadolini too, as it recites, “I have two loves, my country and Paris”.

De Angelis and Marconi have done a really significant and at times superlative job thanks also to Travaglini’s archival support. Spadò – Il danzatore nudo, which is also available with English subtitles, is an important work, another step towards a better comprehension of Spadolini’s enigmatic figure.